UNIT 5

Initiating and maintaining relationships with others is one of the most necessary and challenging functions of human survival. Our self-concept and self-esteem is sustained largely on the substance of our relationships with others. From our relational partners we receive feedback that we use to assess ourselves. In essence, the only way we know ourselves is through our relationships with others. Our existence is relative to other people.

Regardless of one's cultural origins, relationships provide the substance of life. In this chapter, a variety of topics associated with relationships will be explored. The first section deals with uncertainty reduction and factors that affect how people go about reducing uncertainty, including intercultural communication apprehension and socio-communicative style. The next part of the chapter focuses on empathy, third culture building, and similarity. The third part of the chapter examines how perceptions about relationships vary across cultures with particular emphasis on how relationships are perceived in Eastern and Western cultures. The final part of the chapter looks at marital relationships, including mate selection across cultures, arranged marriages, and divorce.

Conflict is an inevitable part of being in a society with others. All types of human relationships, from strangers, to acquaintances, to intimates experience conflict. Communication plays a paradoxical role in most conflicts because it requires communication to instigate conflict and it requires communication to resolve conflict.

Unfortunately, conflict is the source of much relational stress and dissolution.

Fortunately, the successful resolution of conflict is one of the strongest and most consistent predictors of relational satisfaction. Hence, an understanding of conflict and how to resolve it is an essential part of becoming a competent communicator, especially in your relationships with persons from other cultures

This chapter focuses on the definition of intercultural conflict, presents a theoretical model of intercultural conflict, discusses the concept of face, facework, and communication conflict styles, and finally, examines how individualistic, collectivistic, and high and low context cultures address conflict.

Educational disparities exist in higher education such as entrance rates, graduation rates, and time to degree across ethnic and gender groups. A key perspective of this text is that understanding intercultural communication from a layered approach can help illuminate some of the reason for social problems such as disparities in health outcomes. What is the role that instructional communication plays in educational disparities?

The primary thesis is that one reason that educational disparities occur is because the culture of the educational institution is not a match to many students of color’s home culture. This mismatch results from cultural differences and discrimination in a variety of communication behaviors including classroom management and learning/teaching styles. Three aspects of classroom management introduced are immediacy, communicating expectations, and engaging and culturally appropriate content. Learning styles consider cooperative vs. individual learning and Kolb’s experiential learning model.

However, like with any social problem, there are not simple solutions to educational disparities. In this case, all faults should not be place on the individual students nor the educational institutions. Both have responsibilities to change and these are addressed in the layered section. Further, larger societal factors play a role in educational disparities. These factors include affirmative action policies and the support that students of color receive from their home culture. A number of studies illustrate that disparities are strongly related to the support (or lack thereof) received from family members and community members. This complexity to the education success of all students is important to examine. Intercultural communication plays a significant role, but there are also other factors such as socio-economic status (SES) and whether a student is a 1st generation college student. Students are quite interested in this topic as they can easily relate to the concepts being discussed and it helps to explain the difficulties they (and friends/family members) have faced in higher education. It is important to seek to understand the complexity of the problem and avoid simple solutions and stereotypes.
 

The focus of culture and health necessarily considers health disparities. The reduction and elimination of health disparities are the target of Health People 2010 and draw the focus of public health and intercultural scholars alike. Disparities can be created on both a public health (e.g., health campaigns) and clinical health level (e.g., patient-provider communication). The problem of health disparities is complex and involves socio-economic status (SES), health care obstacles, cultural health beliefs, and cultural competence.

Trying to understand health disparities involves examining communication and non communication factors. Several factors not involving intercultural communication (e.g., SES and health care services) are presented in this chapter to help illustrate the complexity of the problem. Factors that directly involve communication include cultural health beliefs, obstacles to health care utilization, and cultural competence and sensitivity. Cultural competence focuses on the communication between patients and providers, while cultural sensitivity examines broader communication messages such as communication campaigns. Understanding cultural health beliefs is relevant for both of these factors.

Good health certainly is the responsibility of individuals and thus bottom-up effects are important. Additionally, individual providers need to take responsibility for their cultural competence. However, health care organizations and societal factors play a significant role in good health. Health care organizations and government have a responsibility for adopting policies and practices that encourage cultural competence in providers. Public health professionals have a responsibility for creating culturally sensitive practices.

 To be more culturally competent and sensitive, several recommendations are provided. First, the use of hybrid approaches to health care enhances cultural competence. Hybrid approaches blend Western and traditional medicine. Second, motivational interviewing is a skill that providers can used to be more culturally competent. Third, media advocacy and communication campaigns can follow a series of steps to be more culturally sensitive.

Source: http://ehsclassof68.com/images/cartoon_more_than_sheep_c.jpg

1.  Go to the National Geographic site and view a film from the Taboo series, http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/series/taboo/all/Overview for example. How can you become less judgmental and more accepting of cultures with practices very different from your own? Use examples from the film to explain concepts from this unit.

2.  In as much detail as possible, describe a conflict you have either experienced or observed with a person from another culture. Describe the role of culture in the communication situation and explain how the conflict was managed. 

Engage with other students by discussing (a.) concepts you learned in this week's reading, (b.) how you are applying what you learn, and (c.) ideas of other students. Please post on multiple days during the week.

PREREADING (Wednesday)

This week you will examine Intercultural Relationships, Intercultural Conflict, how culture affects education and health care. What do you want to know or need to learn about these topic?

FACT QUESTIONS (Friday)

Read the textbook assignment before you discuss an idea from the chapter reading. You will find the question is in the unit link called "Fact Questions." Your professor may assign a number to you for the term so students answer different questions. In that case, answer that question number each week. If there are fewer questions than your number, count through the list twice until you reach your assigned number.

MEASURE (Sunday)

Complete an assessment measure from the reading. What were your results? What are the implications for your multicultural communication strengths and needs.

ACTIVITY--APPLICATION (Sunday)

See the Activity link and complete an Activity so you apply the principles from the reading. Discuss how you are improving your multicultural communication skills.

PROFESSOR'S CHOICE
General discussion, alternative points of views, stories, videos to watch, and media links. If the provided link doesn't work, conduct an Internet search to find your own choice for an interesting link about exemplary multicultural communication.

1. In thinking about the quote, “Without others, there is no self,” how do your family, friends, and professors define who you are?

2. What are the communication strategies you use to reduce uncertainty when interacting with others?

3. After completing the Socio-communicative Orientation scale in this chapter, how does your level of assertiveness and responsiveness affect your relationships?

4. What are the primary characteristics you look for in a potential relational partner? How does that compare to the information presented in the chapter?

5. Why would you or would you not consider a person from a different culture as a potential mate?

6. Recount the fundamental assumptions of Uncertainty Reduction Theory.

7. Discuss the relationship between uncertainty reduction and intercultural communication apprehension.

8. Cogently discuss the fundamental assumptions of Anxiety Uncertainty Management Theory

9. Identify assertive and responsive socio-communicative styles.

10. Define relational empathy and third culture building.

11. Compare ratings of relational intimacy across cultures.

12. Describe differences in relationships between Eastern and Western cultures.

13. Compare marital types across cultures.

14. Compare divorce rates across cultures.

15. Define intercultural conflict.

16. Recall a conflict that you have experienced. How did your cultural background affect how you handled it?

17. What types of intercultural conflicts occur on your college or university campus? What groups or cultures have frequent conflicts?

18. How do cultural groups manage and address the conflict?

19. Do you prefer to handle conflict directly or prefer to avoid it altogether

20. What irritates you the most about how people from other cultures handle conflict? Why?

21. List and explain the three levels of conflict.

22. Assess your self-face, other-face, and mutual-face concerns.

23. Define facework and identify three primary facework strategies.

24. List and define the 11 subcategories of facework.

25. List and define the five primary styles of conflict communication.

26. List and define the three secondary styles of conflict communication.

27. Identify and discuss the conflict styles preferred by individualistic and collectivistic

cultures.

28. Identify and discuss the conflict styles preferred by high-context versus low-context cultures.

Directly quoted from Neuliep, J. W. (2009). Intercultural communication: A contextual approach (4th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

I. Communication and Uncertainty

A. Initiating communication with a stranger, particularly a person from a different culture, can be frightening. A communication theory called Uncertainty Reduction Theory (URT) is an attempt to explain our communication behavior during initial communication encounters with others. The major premise guiding this theory is that when strangers first meet, their primary goal is to reduce uncertainty and increase the predictability about the behavior of themselves and the other person. The original theory consists of seven axioms.

1. Axiom 1: Given the high level of uncertainty present at the onset of the entry phase, as the amount of verbal communication between strangers increases, the level of uncertainty for each interactant in the relationship will decrease. As uncertainty is further reduced, the amount of verbal communication will increase.

2. Axiom 2: As nonverbal affiliative expressiveness increases, uncertainty levels will decrease in an initial interaction situation. In addition, decreases in uncertainty level will cause increases in nonverbal affiliative expressiveness.

3. Axiom 3: High levels of uncertainty cause increases in information-seeking behavior. As uncertainty levels decline, information-seeking behavior decreases.

4. Axiom 4: High levels of uncertainty in a relationship cause decreases in the intimacy level of communication content. Low levels of uncertainty produce high levels of intimacy.

5. Axiom 5: High levels of uncertainty produce high rates of reciprocity. Low levels of uncertainty produce low reciprocity rates.

6. Axiom 6: Similarities between persons reduce uncertainty, whereas dissimilarities produce increases in uncertainty.

7. Axiom 7: Increases in uncertainty level produce decreases in liking; decreases in uncertainty level produce increases in liking.

B. Although people in any culture seek to reduce uncertainty, the verbal and nonverbal communication strategies people use to reduce uncertainty varies from culture to culture. People from high context cultures try to reduce uncertainty in initial encounters but the nature of the information they seek seems to be different than that sought by persons from low context cultures.

1. Because much of the information resides in the context as opposed to the individual, persons from high context cultures are more cautious concerning what they talk about with strangers.

2. Certain types of information are more important sources of uncertainty to persons in high context cultures than in low context cultures, including the other's social background, knowing whether others will behave in a socially appropriate manner, knowing that others understand individuals' feelings, knowing what others mean when they communicate, and knowing whether others will make allowances for individuals when they communicate.

C. Uncertainty is assessed using some form of variation of an instrument called the CL7. The scale is designed to assess the degree of attributional confidence (i.e., how much uncertainty) a person has about another person after initial interactions.

II. Anxiety Uncertainty Management Theory of Effective Communication

A. According to AUM the general processes underlying communication between people from different cultures or ethnicities are the same processes underlying communication between people from the same culture.

B. AUM and Uncertainty Reduction Theory (URT) are similar in that each theory focuses on the effects of uncertainty and anxiety on communication. AUM shifts the focus from uncertainty and anxiety reduction to uncertainty and anxiety management. AUM also incorporates the concepts of mindfulness and communication effectiveness. The focus of AUM is toward effective communication; that is, to the extent that interactants can manage uncertainty and anxiety, and be mindful, effective communication can be achieved.

C. According to AUM, uncertainty is a cognitive phenomena. Uncertainty affects the way people think about communication and involves our ability, or inability, to predict a stranger’s attitudes, beliefs, values, and behaviors. People experience more uncertainty when interacting with strangers. Anxiety is the affective equivalent of uncertainty

D. In addition to uncertainty and anxiety, AUM incorporates the concepts of mindfulness and communication effectiveness. Mindfulness refers to the idea that most of the time, people are not acutely aware of their behavior, that they operate on a kind of automatic pilot. To be sure, many communicative acts are routine or habitual and do not require intense cognitive attention. Mindfulness, on the other hand, refers to a person’s conscious attention to incoming information. A mindful communicator is open to new information and the processing of new categories. Mindful communicators perceive aspects of the self and others that mindless communicators miss.

III. Uncertainty Reduction and Intercultural Communication Apprehension

A. One factor which may affect how persons reduce uncertainty is whether they experience intercultural communication apprehension. Because intercultural communication is loaded with novelty and dissimilarity, people might experience inordinate amounts of anxiety that inhibit the ability to reduce uncertainty.

1. If uncertainty is above our maximum tolerance level we may feel uncomfortable communicating. If uncertainty is below your minimum threshold, you may find the interaction dull and uninteresting.

2. Uncertainty and anxiety are related such that as uncertainty increases so does anxiety. Like uncertainty, you have maximum and minimum thresholds for anxiety. When anxiety is above your maximum tolerance level, you will experience so much anxiety that you may even evade interacting with others or withdraw from communication. When anxiety is below your minimum levels, you may feel unmotivated to reduce uncertainty.

B. Berger and Calabrese maintain that the principal way people reduce uncertainty during initial interaction is via verbal and nonverbal communication. To the extent that people can reduce uncertainty and anxiety during communication they can increase their communication effectiveness.

C. Although faced with large amounts uncertainty and anxiety during initial intercultural communication, an individual's communication style may enable him/her to effectively reduce uncertainty. Two dimensions of communication style are called assertiveness and responsiveness.

1. Assertiveness refers to an individual's ability to make requests, actively disagree, express positive or negative personal rights and feelings, initiate, sustain, and terminate conversations, and defend oneself without attacking others.

2. Responsiveness refers to an individual's ability to be sensitive to the communication of others, be a good listener, engage in comforting communication, and recognize the needs and wants of relevant others.

IV. An Intercultural Conversation about Uncertainty Reduction and Socio-Communicative Style

A. In the intercultural conversations presented in this chapter, we see how an individual's socio-communicative style affects uncertainty reduction during initial intercultural communication. In the first conversation we see Dan, who is from the United States, interacting with Natasha, who is from Ukraine. Dan seems unassertive and unresponsive. In the second conversation we see Jim, who is from the United States, interacting with Foday who is from Sierre Leone. In comparison to Dan, Jim seems assertive and responsive. Jim's assertiveness and responsiveness helps him reduce uncertainty about Foday and Sierre Leone.

V. Assessing Socio-Communicative Orientation/Style

A. Assertiveness and responsiveness are measured using scales developed by McCroskey and Richmond. These scales have been used successfully in other cultures, including China, Finland, Japan, Korea, and Russia. Note, however, that these scales were designed to measure assertiveness and responsiveness as defined in the United States and may not be generalizable across all cultures. In fact, studies examining assertiveness and responsiveness across cultures have reported differences. American males and females, for example, score higher on the assertiveness dimension than Finnish and Japanese males and females. Generally, American women score higher on the responsiveness scale than males and females from other cultures. Within most cultures, however, males generally score higher on the assertiveness scale while women score higher on the responsiveness scale.

VI. Empathy and Similarity in Relationship Development

A. As uncertainty is reduced, people get to know each other more and can work on developing their relationship. The ability to empathize with someone is a crucial ingredient in any relationship. Empathy takes on added importance in intercultural relationships, however. Because persons from other cultures are different than we are, it may be difficult for us to empathize with them, their ideas, and their style of communication.

B. Empathy is often defined as the degree to which we can accurately infer another's thoughts or feelings. This definition is inadequate for the study of intercultural communication. Broome offers what he calls a model of relational empathy. Broome argues that because our thoughts and perceptions are based on our unique personal, cultural, sociocultural, and individual past experiences we can never completely comprehend or directly know what another is thinking or feeling.

C. According to the model, persons can not possess direct, firsthand knowledge of the emotional states or cognitive processes of another person. Instead, people possess objective and subjective meanings.

1. Objective meaning, according to Broome, is an individual's interpretation of his/her own personal experiences to themselves.

2. Subjective meaning, on the other hand, is an individual's interpretation of the other person's experiences in relation to one's own.

3. When two people come together and interact, they create a third culture and interdependent meaning; that is, new meaning based on the combining of each individual's objective and subjective meanings. Through the establishment of relational empathy, an interdependent interpretation and approximation of reality materializes.

D. Intercultural researcher Donald Klopf maintains that we can approach empathy with others by developing empathic listening skills. Empathic listening means listening more to the meanings than to the words of another person. According to Klopf, empathic listening involves (a) paraphrasing; or the rewording of what the other person has said, (b) reflecting feelings; relating back to the other the feelings we believe the other is experiencing, (c) reflecting meanings; the restating of what we heard to confirm its meaning, and (d) summarizing; briefly restating the major topics the other has communicated.

VII. Similarity

A. A great deal of research has demonstrated that similarity plays a key role in the establishment and development of relationships. Intercultural researchers have found that the more we perceive another as similar to ourselves, the more we are able to reduce uncertainty about the person and form accurate categories of them. In this way, similarity may be particularly important during initial encounters with another person.

B. Though similarity may come in many forms, Byrne's efforts have focused mainly on attitude similarity and attraction. Byrne's fundamental postulate is that attitude similarity between persons leads to positive affect which in turn leads to attraction.

VIII. Perceptions of Relational Intimacy Across Cultures

A. Although the same types of relationships exist across cultures, the level of intimacy varies considerably. Gudykunst and Nishida studied the influence of culture on perceptions of intimacy and communication behavior between the United States and Japan. They reasoned that because of their collectivistic tendencies, the Japanese students would perceive ingroup relationships as more intimate than would United States students who are individualistic. They also maintained that because Japan is considered a masculine-oriented culture where sex roles are clearly differentiated, these types of relationships (e.g., lover, spouse, boy/girlfriend) would be perceived as less intimate than in the United States.

IX. Eastern and Western Cultures and Relationships

A. In individualistic cultures like the United States, relationships are typically viewed from the perspective of the self. Individualists see themselves as a distinct individuals who participate in relationships to maximize their own self-interests. In many collectivistic cultures, like China, relationships are guided by Confucianism.

1. The fundamental theme of Confucianism is that proper relationships form the cornerstone of society. An individual's conduct in society should be guided by four principles: humanism, where people treat others as they wish to be treated; faithfulness, meaning loyalty rather than personal interest or profit; propriety, referring to social decorum and etiquette; and wisdom.

B. Relational partners in Eastern cultures engage in long-term and asymmetrical reciprocity. In Confucian philosophy, dependency on others is an inevitable and accepted part of relations with others. People will always be indebted to others who help or assist them in some way. Under this system of reciprocity, the individual does not calculate what he or she gives and receives.

C. Another difference between Eastern and Western relationships is that in many Eastern cultures there is a clear difference between who is and is not a member of the ingroup and outgroup. Confucian philosophy prescribes that people associate and identify with relatively few yet very cohesive groups.

D. A fourth difference between relationships of Eastern and Western cultures is the use of intermediaries (i.e., go-betweens). For the most part, persons in Western cultures prefer direct face to face contact with those with whom they maintain interpersonal relations, including business partners. In Eastern cultures, because the distinctions between ingroups and outgroups is so well defined, the use of intermediaries becomes essential and they are used even in informal situations, as in introductions, dating, marital arrangements, and even relatively small business transactions.

X. Marital Relationships

A. The most common type of marriage practice is monogamy; that is, marriage between one man and one woman. Monogamy is practiced in the United States and in most western cultures. Most cultures prefer not to limit the number of spouses available to a person. These cultures practice polygamy; that is, marriage to more than one spouse. Contrary to popular belief, polygamy is not the practice of a husband having multiple wives. Actually, there are two types of polygamy, including polygyny, where a man has multiple wives, and polyandry, where a woman has more than one husband. According to Howard, polygyny is permitted in the majority of societies.

XI. Intercultural and Interracial Marriages

A. Over 97 percent of married couples in the United States are of the same race. It is important to note, however, that these percentages take into account only interracial marriages and couples living together. The number of intercultural, or cross-cultural, marriages may be much higher.

Photo source: http://mayagranny.blogspot.com/2007/06/my-roof-my-rules.html

B. In addition to the growing number of cross-cultural marriages, American attitudes about these relationships are changing. A 2001 survey conducted by the Washington Post, the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, and Harvard University found that 86% of Black respondents said their families would welcome a White, Asian, or Hispanic person to their family. Among Whites, 66% would accept Hispanics or Asians, but only 55% would accept a Black person. Among Hispanics, 86%would accept Whites, 79%would accept Asians, and 74% would accept Blacks. Among Asians, 77% would accept Whites, 71% would accept Hispanics, and 66% would accept Blacks.

Although the percentage of cross-cultural marriages is growing, and the attitudes about such relationships are improving, cross-cultural (i.e., racial or ethnic) relationships are susceptible to pressures and strains not experienced in same-race or same-ethnicity marriages or relationships. For example, results from the same survey reported above indicate that 65% of White–Black couples said they experienced problems within their families at the start of their relationship, and 24% of White– Asian or White–Hispanic couples reported problems

XII. Mate Selection Across Cultures

A. Professor David Buss has lead The International Mate Selection Project. The focus of Buss's work has been to identify preferences people have when they choose a mate. According to Buss, scholars from myriad academic fields are interested in mating practices and mate selection.

B. The purpose of his research was to identify which characteristics individuals value in potential mates, to identify similarities among countries in their values, to identify the ways cultures differ in their values, to identify clusters of countries that are similar to each other and to identify sex differences within each country on the degree of variation of mate selection.

C. Buss and his research collaborators surveyed over 10,000 people from 33 different countries. In the study, individuals were asked to complete the "Factors in Choosing a Mate" scale and the "Preferences Concerning a Potential Mate" instruments. After analyzing the completed surveys, Buss found that in spite of the unique cultural variability associated with each sample, there were substantial commonalities among all samples.

XIII. Arranged Marriages

A. In some cultures an individual's preference in selecting a mate becomes moot because the person's marriage is arranged by his/her parents or a trusted family friend and/or mediator. In many instances, the bride and groom of an arranged marriage do not even meet until the day of the wedding. In many cultures, a bride price similar to that of a dowry is an essential ingredient to the arranged marriage. Although not as common as they once were, arranged marriages are still practiced in a variety of cultures and within some micro-cultural groups in the United States, such as the Hmong.

XIV. Marital Dissolution and Divorce Across Cultures

A. Like marriage practices, divorce customs vary across cultures. In many cultures social and economic issues often play a role in divorce decisions. Factors such as income, sexual dissatisfaction, childlessness, women's equality issues, religion, and the ease with which one can obtain a divorce all vary across cultures. In general, monogamy is correlated with lower divorce rates than polygamy.

Directly quoted from Neuliep, J. W. (2009). Intercultural communication: A contextual approach (4th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

I. Definitions of Intercultural Conflict

A. Intercultural conflict is defined as the experience of emotional frustration or mismatched expectations between individuals from different cultures who perceive an incompatibility between their values, norms, goals, scarce resources, or outcomes during an intercultural exchange.

B. Intercultural conflict occurs when cultural group membership factors influence how individuals approach, avoid, and manage conflict. Intercultural conflict involves a certain degree of ethnocentric perceptions and judgments. Ethnocentric persons hold attitudes and behaviors about their ingroup that are biased in favor of the ingroup, often at the expense of the outgroup. Ethnocentric persons foster cooperative relations with ingroup members while competing with, and perhaps even battling, outgroup members. Hence, by virtue of our cultural upbringing, we think we are correct.

II. A Model of Intercultural Conflict

A. Young Yum Kim has developed a model of intercultural conflict. Kim argues that intercultural conflict occurs at three interdependent and interrelated levels, including a micro, or individual level, an intermediary level, and a macro, or societal level.

1. The micro or individual level of intercultural conflict refers to each individual’s unique attitudes, dispositions, and beliefs that he or she brings to the conflict.

2. The intermediary level of intercultural conflict refers to the actual location and context of the conflict. Some environments (e.g., neighborhoods, at school, on the job) may be more likely than others to facilitate conflict.

3. The macro or societal level of intercultural conflict includes factors that probably are out of the control of the interactants. These conditions include any history of subjugation, ideological/ structural inequality, and minority group strength.

III. An Intercultural Conversation: Kim’s Model of Intercultural Conflict

A. Mike Romney is the supervising director of Acme Marketing Firm. Acme is a direct marketing firm for insurance agencies. Mike, 42 years old, is White. He was born and raised in Kenilworth, Illinois, a very wealthy Chicago suburb. Mike has six directors under him in Acme’s organizational hierarchy. These six directors each manage and supervise about 7 employees. Thus, Mike supervises over 50 employees. Once a year, Mike has one-on-one meetings with each employee. These annual meetings are a part of each employee’s annual evaluation.

Today, Mike is meeting with Nicole Norton. Nicole is a relatively new employee and has worked for Acme for just over a year. This will be her first annual evaluation meeting. She was hired as a telemarketer and hopes to move up in the organization soon. She is Black and 33 years old. She was raised in the city of Chicago, in the Robert Taylor public housing district, a notoriously impoverished and violent area. Their meeting takes place in Mike’s office.

IV. The Concept of Face, Facework, and Communication Conflict Styles

A. The concept of face explains how people of different cultures manage conflict. Face refers to a person’s sense of favorable self-worth or self-image experienced during communicative situations. Face is an emotional extension of the self-concept. Face is considered a universal concept; that is, people in all cultures have a sense of face, but the specific meanings of face may vary across cultures. There are three types of face, including self-face, other-face, and mutual-face. Self-face is the concern for one’s own image, other-face is the concern for another’s image, and mutual-face is the concern for both parties’ images or the image of the relationship. One’s face can be threatened, enhanced, undermined, and bargained over both emotionally and cognitively. Generally, persons of individualistic cultures have a greater concern for self face and lesser concern for other-face than members of collectivistic cultures, however. The concept of face becomes particularly significant in situations where uncertainty is high, as in conflict situations when the character of the communicators might be called into question

B. Specifically, facework refers to the communicative strategies employed to manage one’s own face or to support or challenge another’s face. Facework can be employed to initiate, manage, or terminate conflict. Three general types of facework strategies that are used in intercultural conflict. These include dominating, avoiding, and integrating facework (see Table 10.1). Dominating facework behaviors are characterized by an individual’s need to control the conflict situation and defend his or her self-face. Avoiding facework behaviors focus on an attempt to save the face of the other person. Integrating facework allows for the shared concern for self- and other-face and strives for closure in the conflict.

C. In addition to the facework strategies one might use to manage face during conflict, researchers have studied conflict interaction styles. Whereas facework is employed to manage and uphold face during conflict, conflict interaction styles refer to ways individuals manage the actual conflict. How people manage communication during conflict differs considerably across cultures

1. One’s conflict interaction style is based on two communication dimensions. The first is the degree to which a person asserts a self-face need, that is, seeks to satisfy his or her own interests during conflict. The second is the degree to which a person is cooperative (i.e., observes an other-face need) and seeks to incorporate the interests of the other. The combination of assertiveness, or self-face need, and cooperativeness, or other-face need, defines five primary communication styles of managing conflict and three secondary styles. The five primary styles are dominating, integrating, obliging, avoiding, and compromising. The three secondary styles include emotional expression, third-party help, and neglect (see Figure 10.3).

V. An Intercultural Conversation: Dominating and Third-Party Conflict Styles

A. Kevin, who grew up in Madison, Wisconsin, is a student at the University of Wisconsin. Kevin is enrolled in an introductory communication course. The professor has assigned Kevin and Kokkeong, an international exchange student from Malaysia, to work on a project together. The professor has given them the option of either submitting a paper or giving a presentation. Kevin and Kokkeong disagree on which option to pursue. Kevin prefers the presentation option, while Kokkeong prefers the paper option

VI. Individualistic and Collectivistic Approaches to Conflict

A. Persons from individualistic cultures approach conflict differently than persons from collectivistic cultures. Individualists tend to follow an outcome-oriented approach to intercultural conflict. Collectivists, on the other hand, tend to follow a process-oriented approach. The outcome-oriented approach preferred by individualists emphasizes the importance of asserting their self-identity in the conflict and the accomplishment of perceived tangible outcomes or goals. The process-oriented approach preferred by collectivists focuses on mutual-face or group-face interests. These interests are sought prior to, or in lieu of, any tangible outcomes or goals

VII. Conflict Resolution in High-Context Versus Low-Context Cultures

A. In low-context cultures, such as the United States, individuals are more likely to separate the conflict issue from the persons involved. In high-context cultures, such as China, the conflict issue and the persons involved are typically connected. For example, to directly disagree with someone may be seen as losing face, and is perceived as insulting. Persons in low-context cultures tend to be more direct and explicit in their dealings with conflict, whereas persons in high-context cultures prefer implicit communication. Persons from low-context cultures prefer solution-oriented conflict resolution styles, whereas persons from high-context cultures prefer nonconfrontational styles.

Text directly quoted from Neuliep, J. W. (2009). Intercultural communication: A contextual approach (4th ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Quoted directly or closely adapted from Oetzel, J. G. (2009). Intercultural Communication: A Layered Approach from Boston: Pearson.

Higher Education Contexts
a. Cultural diversity at all levels of education is increasing and it provides challenges and opportunities for teachers, students, and administrators
b. An educational disparity exists when one cultural group has an educational outcome that is worse than that of another cultural group.
Disparities in Educational Outcomes
a. Disparities in college enrollment
i. White Americans and Asian Americans are overrepresented while
other racial groups are underrepresented
ii. Pipeline problem: Groups underrepresented at college are also underrepresented in jobs that require college degrees
b. Disparities in receiving degrees
i. White Americans and Asian Americans are overrepresented, and the other racial groups are underrepresented
ii. Men are overrepresented at the doctoral level and underrepresented at other levels
c. Disparities in graduation rate: African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and
American Indians have a lower 6-year graduation rate than average

Instructional Communication: Communication behaviors related to teaching and learning
a. Classroom Management: It focuses on how the teacher creates an effective learning climate and how she/he interacts with students
i. Immediacy is the extent to which communication behaviors enhance closeness and reduce physical and/or psychological distance between communicators, including using personal examples, using humor, addressing students by name, etc
1. Instructional immediacy focuses on communication behaviors associated with classroom instruction and direct learning
2. Relational immediacy focuses on communication behaviors that enhance the psychological closeness between teacher and students
3. Personal immediacy focuses on communication behaviors related to the moral and ethical behavior of the teacher
4. Teachers who display immediacy with students encourage students’ perceptions for affective and cognitive learning: Affective learning emphasizes the learner’s attitudes and
feelings toward the subject and/or the teacher while cognitive learning focuses on the comprehension, the retention, the recall, and the application of knowledge and information
5. Teacher immediacy and disparities across race/ethnic groups
a. Less immediacy is being displayed to students of color than to White American students due to the different definition of teacher immediacy across cultures
b. Differences in power distance – the mainstream U.S. is small power distance, and thus students from a large power distance culture may regard American teacher’s behavior inappropriate.
c. While the mainstream U.S. culture focuses on
instructional immediacy, many minority groups in the
U.S. emphasizes relational and personal immediacy.
ii. Communicating expectations
1. The expectations teachers have of students affect student performance
2. Teachers often set low expectations for cultural minorities and female students
3. Teachers create low expectations for students in a variety of ways
4. Students themselves also contribute to low expectations by internalizing stereotypes regarding performance
iii. Engaging and culturally appropriate content
1. Teachers should engage all students with culturally appropriate content
2. It is often the case that the way the classroom works and what is studies is a mismatch to the home culture of many students of color (e.g. reading assignments that only focus on works written by White European scholars)
3. Barriers in discussing race and culture in the classroom
a. Teachers who do not truly value participation
b. Teachers who display discomfort in talking about racism
c. Teachers who are threatened by students’ knowledge
d. Gaps in experiences and knowledge among students of
color and white students
e. Tension and disagreements
4. Strategies for addressing racism in the classroom
a. Teacher laying out clear parameters in advance of the discussion
b. Teacher modeling diversity through the structure and content of the class
c. Teacher being aware of own cultural biases
d. Students being motivated to learn
e. Student feeling safe and challenged
b. Learning Styles: Preferred manner in which people learn
i. Individual vs. Cooperation
1. Individual (separate) learning focuses on critical thinking, objective observation, abstract analysis, and individual performance.
2. Cooperative (connected) learning focuses on personal reflection, subjective reactions, consciousness-raising, and cooperative performance
3. These learning types are closely connected to cultural individualism and collectivism
4. Talking to learn is often used by individual learners – silence is seen as an indicator of not knowing the answer or not being educated
5. Active listening and silence are often used by cooperative learners – talking is seen as an indicator of selfishness and insecurity
6. The mismatches between communication style of mainstream university education and that of students of color may be one of the reasons the students feel disconnected from the university
ii. Experiential learning model
1. Kolb’s (1984) experiential learning model conceptualizes learning as a cycle of four elements, that are constructed from two dimensions: abstract-concrete (degree of involvement or analytic detachment form the subject matter) and action-reflection (degree of doing versus reflecting/observing)
2. Four elements
a. Concrete experience provides first-hand experience of the subject matter
b. Reflective observation provides the learner an opportunity to observe and think about the meaning of the observation
c. Abstract conceptualization provides the learner with the opportunity to weigh the strengths and limitation of perspectives
d. Active experimentation provides the learner the opportunity to directly test what has been learned in the precious three stages
3. Four different learning styles
a. Accommodators
i. Combination of concrete experience and active experimentation
ii. Accommodators solve problems through trial and error and enjoy teaching others
iii. They are good at adopting to the immediate situation
b. Convergers
i. Combination of active experimentation and abstract conceptualization
ii. Convergers like practical application of ideas and learn by doing and thinking in an unemotional manner
c. Divergers
i. Combination of concrete experience and reflective observation
ii. Divergers are good at viewing an event from many perspectives and organizing many relationships into a meaningful whole
iii. They work well with groups
d. Assimilators
i. Combination of reflective observation and abstract conceptualization
ii. Assimilators like to create theoretical models and learn by watching and thinking
iii. They value order, expert opinion, detailed information and certainty.

c. Peer-to-peer communication
i. Social support from peers is an important element of the learning process
ii. Social support is a part of relationships in which individuals provide aid, assistance, and comfort to others
1. Social support helps students to cope with the stress of learning
2. It also helps international students and students of color coping in multicultural environments

iii. Intercultural conflict at schools
1. Cultural differences create misunderstandings among the groups
2. Historical treatment of one group tends to be more negative than of another group
3. An incident occurs that escalates tensions into violence
iv. Peer-to-peer communication and disparities across groups
1. Peer-to-peer communication can be beneficial when students receive positive emotional support, while it can hurt educational attainment when students receive negative support including experiencing intercultural conflict
2. Peer support fro students of color is more likely to be negative than for White American students
3. Intercultural conflict in schools has a greater frequency and impact on students of color than White American students IV. Layered Perspective on Educational Contexts
a. Bottom-up effects
i. Individual teachers can strive to make her/his classroom inclusive of many cultures and perspectives
ii. Individual students can be an agent of change for positive intercultural relations
iii. Social networks (e.g. family members and peers) can encourage the success or failure for students and thus contribute to educational disparities
iv. Discomfort with White values and perceived disconnection with their own cultural values impede students of color’s academic success
b. Top-down effects: Educational institutions’ impact on individuals
i. Individuals are impacted by a variety of organizational and societal constraints
ii. Examples include institutional barriers, resistance from some privileged colleagues, lack of personal understanding, and despair
iii. Diversity climate (prevailing attitude toward diversity in an organization) of a classroom and institution has a large impact on whether cultural differences are appreciated or discouraged
c. Top-down effects: Societal impact on educational institutions
i. Community factors: degree of segregation and integration as well as the level of community cohesion and supervision
1. Community integration and segregation influence children of immigrants’ educational attainment
2. Cohesion and supervision in communities protect children from delinquency
ii. Affirmative action
1. Justification for affirmative action
a. African Americans used to go to segregated schools and received limited opportunities to excel in higher education
b. Access to higher education was not going to improve because the measures of merit were biased against minority group and the people making decisions on admissions were often White and thus biased toward their own group.
c. The goal for universities is to educate a student body that is representative of society as a whole
2. Opposition against affirmative action
a. Affirmative action has already achieved its goal and is not needed now
b. It increases racial tensions
c. It makes minority students struggle after being admitted because they cannot keep up
d. Challenging and skills
i. Self-reflexivity: The ability to understand yourself and your own cultural biases
ii. To enhance abilities in dialoging about race and culture’
1. Instructors need to be aware of what diversity means to them, that is, being self-reflexive
2. Instructors should model diversity in how they organize the class
3. Instructors should model positive support for students
4. Instructors should establish parameters for content and discussion
iii. Creating a community of practice
1. Communities of practice are “groups of people who share a concern, a set of problems, or a passion about a topic, and who deepen their knowledge and expertise in this area by interacting on an ongoing basis.”
2. They can be created by meeting regularly, sharing ideas and research, and creating a network of like-minded individuals

Quoted directly or closely adapted from Oetzel, J. G. (2009). Intercultural Communication: A Layered Approach from Boston: Pearson.

Health Care Contexts

I. Introduction
a. Health Care Contexts
i. These contexts are where the health of the individual and the population are the focus.
ii. There two types of health care contexts:
1. Clinical contexts are locations where patients receive care from some sort of provider such as the doctor’s office hospital and health clinic.
i. In a clinical context, you, the patient is the focus.
ii. The best outcome is you “getting better” after visiting. 2. Public health is efforts toward assuring conditions in which people can be healthy.
i. Public health differs from clinical medicine in three ways:
1. Public health focuses on prevention rather than treatment.
2. Public health measures health outcomes in
terms of communities and not individuals.
ii. Public health involves partnering with the public.
b. Health communication is the exchange of symbolic messages related to
personal and public health.
c. Health is a complete state of physical, mental, and social well being, not simply the absence of disease.

Health Disparities
a. Health disparities are inequalities in health outcomes for different cultural groups.
b. A health disparity exists when one cultural group has a health outcome that is worse than another cultural group.
c. A health disparity does not mean that every individual in one cultural group experiences the health problem or that everybody in one culture has a better health outcome than everyone else in a different group.
d. Health disparities focus on general trends in cultural groups, not on individuals.
e. Health disparities are often presented in statistics about groups.
f. Examples of health disparities are:
i. Life expectancy rates across nations
ii. Mortality rates by ethnic groups in the US
iii. Patterns of mental health by ethnic groups in the US
iv. Patterns of breast cancer

Factors Related to Health Disparities
a. Socioeconomic status is one factor that is associated with health disparities.
i. SES refers to the financial and educational statuses that mark individual and cultural groups.
ii. At the individual layer, SES is associated with health in several ways:
1. First, three components of SES are related to poor health:
persistent low income, income instability, and low childhood
SES.
2. Second, a ceiling effect exists for the impact of income on health where as the level of income rises, so do the health outcomes up to a point.
iii. In addition to an individual’s SES, the community in which an individual lives is also important in two ways:
1. First, the overall SES of a community impacts the individuals living there.
2. Second, for developed nations, the level of income inequality is important.
b. The second factor that is associated with health disparities is health care system problems.
i. The nature of the health care system has a role in explaining health disparities.
1. In the U.S., health care system includes both public and private aspects.
2. The public health system includes components of public health care such as Veterans Association and the Indian Health Service.
i. These systems of care provide health care services for free as specific facilities, but are available for only particular populations.
ii. Public health components such as research and promotion are addressed by the federal and state governments.
iii. The private components are the source of health care for the majority of people.
1. The vast majority of clinics and hospitals are funded by private insurance.
2. The vast majority of U.S. Americans are covered by health insurance, and this private system finances the vast majority of health care.
ii. The lack of availability of specialty services and culturally appropriate services is also a factor for health disparities.
1. Services include drug abuse counseling, mental health treatment, psychotherapy, health specialties, gynecological care, alternative therapies, and many other services.
2. Coverage for mental health and drug abuse is not as consistent although most insurance plans have this coverage.
3. In rural settings, funding may not be available for specialty care, and patients have to travel to more metropolitan areas.
4. The lack of culturally appropriate services and translators is also a barrier to effective treatment.
i. Most hospitals do not have sufficient services for translators or do not have translators on call for less common languages.
ii. The ability to translate addresses language barriers but also must focus on cultural understanding and
respectful communication.
5. Since the health care system is a loosely connected patchwork quilt of doctors and services, coordination of service is problematic.

c. Cultural health beliefs and behaviors is the third factor associated with health disparities.
i. Health behaviors are influenced by general health beliefs such as the attributions we make about health, that is, our explanations about the causes of our health problems and diseases.
ii. There are two categories of health beliefs:
1. General beliefs consist of three variables that are associated with most theories of health behavior: perceived threat, perceived efficacy, and barriers
i. Perceived threat is the degree that a person feels
concerned by a particular disease or health problem.
ii. Perceived efficacy is the degree to which a person feels
he can perform certain behaviors to avoid the threat.
iii. Barriers are the perceived psychological, financial, or
physical costs that inhibit the behavior.
2. Cultural health beliefs are culturally based factors that work
with threat, efficacy, and barriers to influence health behavior.
i. There are many such beliefs, but three are animism,
familism, and fatalism.
1. Animism is the belief in supernatural beings such as good and evil spirits, spirits of inanimate objects.
2. Familism is the influence of family values on health decisions and is closely related to the notions of individualism and collectivism.
3. Fatalism is the perceived lack of control over one’s environment.
ii. All three influence health behaviors.
iii. General and cultural health beliefs influence health-seeking behavior and other types of health behavior.
1. In regards to health-seeking behavior, people who accept behavioral-environmental attributions tend to use mainstream health-care services such as visiting a doctor; they avoid traditional cultural practices for healing.
2. Equity attributions result in people who delay health care seeking and use traditional healers such as curanderas, medicine men, shamans, healing ceremonies, and folk remedies.
iv. Health beliefs also influence everyday choices about health behaviors.
1. Witte and Morrison’s extended parallel process model demonstrates how these variables influence whether people adopt danger control or fear control from a message communicating a health threat.
i. Danger control is a stance that people take when they feel they can control what happens to them.
ii. Fear control is a stance that people take when they do not feel that can control what happens to them.
2. People who use danger control tend to seek information and
enact preventive behaviors while those who use fear control
tend to avoid information and refuse to talk about the problem. d. The fourth factor associated with health disparities is service utilization
obstacles.
i. One of the protectors of good health is the utilization of appropriate and effective services.
ii. Generally, most cultural groups do not utilize physical and mental health services at the appropriate level.
iii. In a study of reported by American Indian adults, the following obstacles limit service utilization: self-reliance; privacy issues; quality of care; and communication/trust.
1. Self-reliance obstacles focus on the desire to solve the problem on one’s own.
i. People with mental health and substance abuse problems have a tendency to try to solve the problem on their own at first and/or avoid treatment for disorders.
ii. The context of self-reliance by cultural minority groups must be considered within the larger context of history and racism.
2. Privacy obstacles focus on the desire for others not to know about the patient’s health seeking behavior.
i. This obstacle points to the stigma associated with mental health treatment in particular, but also physical health.
ii. We do not like people to know our business or to know that we are somehow vulnerable.
3. Quality of care obstacles emphasize the available and effectiveness of treatment options.
i. The perceived and actual quality of health services available affects its use.
ii. The availability of care focuses on two interrelated aspects.
1. First, treatment sectors need to have culturally appropriate services and clinicians.
2. Second, the structure and financing of care is undergoing significant changes in both mainstream and tribal sectors.
4. Communication/trust obstacles focus on interaction with providers and center on trust and understanding.
i. How much pain a patient can endure, the degree of stress she/he experiences, the motivation to seek medical advice, and the overall satisfaction with care is indicated by the quality of communication between the patient and the provider.
ii. Communication problems occur for several reasons:
1. Patients’ socialization to care regardless of cultural/ethnic background is different than that of doctors.
2. Second, health care providers come from different cultural backgrounds than their patients.
e. The fifth factor associated with health care disparities is culturally competent communication.
i. Health disparities are related to cultural competence and sensitive communication.
ii. Cultural competence is the ability to communicate in a culturally appropriate and effective manner.
iii. Cultural sensitivity is the extent to which ethnic or cultural characteristics, experience, norms, values, behavior patterns, and beliefs of a target population, and relevant historical, environmental, and social forces are incorporated in the design, delivery, and evaluation of targeted health interventions programs.

IV. Layers of Health Communication
a. Introduction
i. Many public health professionals advocate the layered approach to addressing health disparities.
ii. The social ecological framework emphasizes a shared responsibility for public health; individuals are responsible for choosing healthy lifestyles, providers are responsible for being culturally competent, health care organizations are responsible for providing effective, appropriate, and coordinated care, and governments are responsible for passing effective health policy.
b. Bottom-up Effects
i. The bottom-up effects include individual cases and individuals organizing for change.
ii. We often become aware of the severity of a health problem because of a highly publicized and/or tragic event.
c. Top-down: Influence of Health-Care Contexts on Individuals
i. Three factors related to the health care system that can inhibit health-seeking behavior.
1. Funding and accessibility of the health care system influences the degree to which individuals use health care.
2. Lack of culturally appropriate services inhibits certain cultural groups from seeking health care coverage.
3. Cultural competence of the providers can be an obstacle to service utilization.
ii. Health care systems that provide timely service, culturally appropriate services and culturally competent care, and a relatively easy system to navigate encourage health-seeking behavior.
iii. Most organizations spend a great deal of time and money trying to improve their systems to make them more accessible to patients since a greater number of patients means greater money and improved health outcomes.
d. Top-down: Influence of Society on Health-Care Contexts
i. The larger societal, historical, and legal factors have an important role in shaping health care contexts.
1. First, the nature of health care systems has some grounding in cultures in which the systems operate. Health care systems are generally socialized or privatized.
i. Socialized medicine is a system of publicly administered national health care.
ii. Privatized medicine is a market-based system where private providers deliver health services and private insurance pays for most of the services.
2. Second, globalization has positive and negative effects on health and health communication.
i. Globalization has several negative effects on health and health communication.
1. Globalization has increased the likelihood of worldwide pandemic of infectious diseases given the vast migration of people.
2. Increasing health disparities are likely given that the economic benefits of globalization are distributed unevenly such that the rich appear to get richer and the poor appear to get poorer.
3. The massive migration means that providers and patients will meet in settings where national culture/ethnic culture match is not an option.
ii. Globalization also has positive effects on health and
health communication.
1. The enhanced communication technologies make it possible for us to communicate with health specialists and cultural experts regardless of where they are physically located.
2. Because of enhanced communication technologies coordination of health care systems and enhanced cultural understanding are possible.
3. Governmental standards for cultural competence influence health care system.
i. Standards are organized into three themes: culturally competent care, language access services, and organizational supports for cultural competence.
ii. Standards are organized in three levels: mandates, guidelines, and recommendations.
iii. These standards provide some framework for encouraging culturally competent care.

ii. The influence of societal, historical, and legal factors in shaping health care contexts underscores the need for giving it adequate attention. e. Challenges and Skills
i. Developing cultural competence, cultural sensitivity, and media advocacy skills are important keys to addressing health care disparities.
ii. Cultural Competence
1. Taking a class in intercultural communication provides some initial development of cultural competent skills
2. One of the challenges of caring for patients from different cultural backgrounds is to meet their expectations of and traditional types of medicine
i. To address this limitation, some advocate an approach called hybrid therapy
1. American Indian providers are trained in both Western and culturally specific treatment systems.
2. Western-trained American Indian providers work alongside traditional American Indian healers.
ii. The bicultural approach is to acknowledge historical and spiritual roots of health problems, move the patient towards culturally-appropriate behaviors and effective overall treatment, and allow individuals to redefine themselves in culturally appropriate ways.
iii. This therapy is called hybrid because of its blending of approaches and is theoretically and culturally grounded in the historical relationships and experiences of American Indians and other cultural groups
3. Another challenge is providers attempting to change patient’s behaviors.
i. Providers can encourage behavior change in patients through motivational interviewing.
ii. Motivational interviewing is a way to interact with patients to help them to change in a way that they are comfortable with and wanting to do.
4. Patients also need to develop cultural competence with providers.
i. Patients can enhance their care and improve the provider’s quality of care if they provide their explanation of the health problem, ask questions, express concerns, and assert their needs.
ii. Providers think that patients are more effective communicators when they engage in these behaviors..
iii. Cultural Sensitivity
1. Cultural sensitive communication to increase awareness and promote behavior change involves the following steps:
i. First, the medium has to be appropriate.
ii. Second, the public health practitioners need to create
intervention that has culturally sensitive messages.
2. These steps have been used to enhance cultural sensitivity and
therefore the effectiveness of the message.
iv. Media Advocacy
1. Media advocacy involves people using the media to promote the health agenda of a particular group.
2. Media advocacy is based on agenda setting theory.
i. Agenda setting theory explains that the media are not successful is telling us what to think, but they are very successful at telling us what to think about.
ii. If a group of individuals is successful at getting their health agenda in the news they have a greater likelihood of influence legislative decisions.
 

Clipart from Microsoft. Photos by C. Aitken-Palmer and as indicated. Copyright. All rights reserved.